THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, August 19, 1996 TAG: 9608190040
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Guy Friddell
LENGTH: 53 lines
My idea of a crusader was Frances Knipp, who taught English and Latin at E.C. Glass High School in Lynchburg. Word of her arrived in a note from K. Johnson Candler of Virginia Beach. Her four children were lucky enough to have classes with Mrs. Knipp.
She was relentless in trying to drive home the difference in the use of verbs ``lie'' and ``lay.''
One morning, walking down the hall between classes, Mrs. Knipp tripped and fell and was lying on the floor, dazed, when one of her pupils happened by.
``MRS. KNIPP,'' she cried, ``WHAT ARE YOU DOING LAYING THERE?''
``LYING,'' screamed Mrs. Knipp, ``LYING!''
Who could forget that lesson?
Reader Jean Bechner cringes every time she hears the pronoun ``me'' used as the subject of a verb, as in ``Me and Joe'' did this or that.
Conversely, more and more she hears the pronoun ``I'' used as the object of a preposition, as in ``for you and I'' or ``with you and I.''
In a recent Virginian-Pilot she saw the expression ``between she and her brother'' and the phrase ``welcome relief to we mere mortals.'' How bracing that our work is under eagle-eyed readers!
A new word floated into my recent column about a Butterfly Festival that took place Sunday at the Tidewater Agricultural Research and Extension Center in Virginia Beach. It's on Diamond Springs Road off Military Highway.
Butterfly watching is taking off just as bird-watching did in the 1930s. For years, clumps of people staring with field glasses at trees were known as bird-watchers, as they are still to me. Indeed, it is the word preferred by the birds, they have confided to me. Neither they nor I can explain why. It just is.
Some years ago ``bird-watchers'' was shortened to ``birders,'' a repellent word, though I know not why.
No matter how many of you object, the birds and I will continue to think of you as bird-watchers.
Now the name catching on for the rapidly increasing numbers of people watching butterflies is ``butterfliers.''
Might not the singular form - ``butterflyer'' - be better?
Trouble is, I told Julia Bristow, founder of The Virginia Butterfly Society, the word butterflyer conjures a picture of an airborne man flapping his arms and kicking his legs as if swimming in air.
``I know, I know!'' she cried. ``Does he have wings?''
``No, but he is well-dressed in suit and tie.''
``But he's carrying a butterfly net, isn't he!'' she exclaimed.
``Now that you mention it, yes!''
With butterflies dwindling, the society hopes that only scientists will be netting them. The rest of us had better plant bushes on which butterflies can nest and feed and look beautiful for children. by CNB